


Clerval Goes To College

by too_much_in_the_sun



Category: Frankenstein - Mary Shelley
Genre: Gen, a really shameful pastiche of Mary Shelley, contains at least one (1) hug
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-12-26
Updated: 2015-12-26
Packaged: 2018-05-09 11:41:26
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 1,894
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5538545
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/too_much_in_the_sun/pseuds/too_much_in_the_sun
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Look man I used all my cleverness in coming up with that title.</p><p>Pretty much what it says on the tin: Clerval accompanies Victor to Ingolstadt.</p><p>This was marked as incomplete for two and a half years, but I finally figured out how to set it correctly.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> All I can tell you about this thing is the following
> 
> 1\. I was going to continue with it, but that's probably not gonna happen now.
> 
> 2\. Therefore I'm posting this under the "well, it's as done as it's ever getting" clause.
> 
> 3\. I found it under the filename "im just doin my job step off im not gay".rtf, which I can only guess was a reference to [this](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hS9KPwfylmg) thing.
> 
> 4\. This is hella not my best pastiche work, but I wanted to get it off Tumblr and somewhere with actual chapters.

It is a singular tragedy to bear witness to the separation of a man from a point of view which he had previously held dear. A preacher who loses his faith in God and a scientist who loses his faith in his ability to discover the secrets of the universe are equally piteous figures. It is a story of one of the latter type of man which I intend to unfold before you now, it having been my privilege to serve as the sole witness to the final disillusionment of one such unfortunate — my dear friend, Victor Frankenstein.

It is an admitted truth that Frankenstein never completed his studies in Ingolstadt, being driven from that city before he could do so by events of a singularly horrible nature which I shall presently relate. He was never to receive the doctorate in medicine towards which he so assiduously strove, nor was his name ever spoken in the tones of awe which he believed his work merited. Yet those who met with him in his time at university invariably took him for not a student, but one who had finished his course of study long since; often his new acquaintances addressed him as “Herr Professor” until gently dissuaded.

The reason for this frequent mistake, I believe, was an indefinable quality of Frankenstein’s physicality. Though he was some years younger than myself, he was quite pale from long hours of study, his hair was worn carelessly in an indifferent style, and his eyes behind their spectacles expressed a subtle, sensitive sorrow, so that the effect of the whole was to give him the appearance of a man twice his age. He himself jested that it was his studies, and his singular devotion thereto, which had wrought his countenance seemingly aged. But when we two were alone together, I heard him express the same opinion with the utmost seriousness.

"You may think it a joke, my dear Clerval," he said on one occasion, when we had retired to our shared sitting room for a last smoke before we departed each other’s company for that of dream, "but I assure you it is true. The things I have seen in my researches might cause weaker men to faint, and turn grey the hair of the sternest investigator. I think it is only the presence of a singularly devoted friend by my side that has prevented me from meeting a very unhappy fate."

Here he smiled at me; a rare occurrence indeed, and one he only permitted in our rare moments of privacy. If Frankenstein had not on occasion made these small gestures of human emotion and pleasure in company, I should have thought him an automaton driven by nothing more than the desire to pursue nature to her hiding places and learn her most terrible secrets. I was privileged to have been his friend from early days indeed, and this disabused me of any notion of his lacking humanity. He was quite human, though his strange pursuits sometimes veiled this fact from those who feared the outcome of his work.

I had first encountered Victor Frankenstein when we were quite young. I have previously mentioned that he was some years my junior, and yet despite this we entered grammar school at the same time, and found ourselves sharing a bench. Frankenstein fast eclipsed me in study of Greek and Latin, easily comprehending what took me weeks to learn. He possesses a very dreamy temperament, and was then not infrequently chastised by the master for not paying attention in lessons. Yet he was conscious enough of the classroom around him to take pity on a poor struggling classmate — namely, myself — and this was how we came to be acquainted.

I am not of as devoted an academic bent as Frankenstein, and it was only with great patience that he helped me learn the rudiments of Greek and Latin. Once I had got the basics well in hand, I did not need his assistance so much, but by that time our friendship was firmly formed.

At the time, I was eight years of age, Frankenstein being three years my junior, though I never suspected how large the difference in our ages truly was until, indeed, the very day we were to leave for university. Despite this disparity, we very soon became inseparable playmates, and in our adolescence close friends.

It came as no surprise to our families that, when Frankenstein announced his intention to continue his studies at the University in Ingolstadt, I immediately determined to join him there. My father was not at first persuaded that I was in need of more education to succeed him in the merchant life, but with his customary eloquence, Frankenstein himself persuaded him that it was to his benefit that I attend the University, for my attainment of higher education could scarcely fail to bring success to the merchant endeavors I would take over on my completion of time at those hallowed halls. As it came to pass, I never did become a merchant in my father’s business, but found my employment in other spaces. And I shudder to think what might have befallen my dear friend away at university without the presence of his closest confidante.

The day we were to leave for Ingolstadt, Frankenstein and I had stayed over at the hotel from which the stagecoach departed. In the morning, as we watched our luggage being packed aboard, my friend was fairly overcome with excitement. He exulted me to think of what new things we might discover at the university, what we might add to the catalog of human knowledge.

I replied that we had better not get ahead of ourselves, for we had not even left our home town yet, and who knew what changes our motivations might suffer during the term of our studies?

He laughed. “Ah! Clerval!” he said merrily. “What should I do without my faithful friend? I know you had intended to study law, but will you consider joining me in studying natural philosophy? I am not sure I can bear the lack of your excellent company.”

I was not interested in law in the least, truthfully, and Frankenstein’s enthusiastic declamations on the subject had persuaded me that natural philosophy was a topic well worthy of investigation. And if I were to become a merchant either way, what did it matter what specific course of study I followed?

“My dear Frankenstein,” I replied, “nothing would give me more joy than to work beside you in your studies.”

“You flatter me,” he said, “but thank you, nevertheless.”

And he flung his arms around my neck in an embrace.


	2. Chapter 2

Frankenstein and I had always been nigh on inseparable, and upon our arrival in Ingolstadt, we set off together to take lodgings. The night before we had discussed the practicalities of attaining housing in the university town, and had come to the agreement that it was most sensible for us to split the cost of renting between us. I think, too, that we were both reluctant to give up each other's society so soon after being rudely uprooted to a new locale.

The elder Frankenstein had sent his son off with a short list of reputable boarding houses in the district nearest the university proper, and we had nearly exhausted this list by the evening of our first day in town. We found every house fully tenanted, and it was with low spirits we set off to the second-to-last address given on the list.

The place stood on a quiet side-street, away from the bars and cafes patronized by the student crowd. Its facade was of ivory-colored brick, and its windows seemed to gaze out on the street like so many placid eyes. I liked it instantly, and since it came with the recommendation of the esteemed senior Frankenstein, it was with somewhat restored hearts that we knocked for entrance.

It was the lady of the house herself who came to the door and bade us enter. She was the widow of a distinguished man, who had been a professor of the university in life. He had been accustomed to offer certain of his students room and board in their rambling house, and she had continued this tradition after his death. 

The good woman showed us to the rooms she was proposing to rent. They took my interest immediately, with their warm, homely furnishings. The windows in the dining room looked out upon a little courtyard where an apple tree grew, and a large window in the sitting room commanded a view of the distant mountains. 

What seized Frankenstein's interest immediately, though, was a small detail; the proximity of the rooms to the servants' stairs at the rear of the building. It was quite apparent that they were disused, and dust lay thick on the steps. He inquired politely if we might see the attic, and our hostess led us upstairs.

I did not at first perceive what possible interest he might have in the place. The attic was one long room, the floor bare and dusty. Motes of dust danced in the beams of late-afternoon sunlight. 

Frankenstein surveyed the room with evident delight. It baffled me what pleased him so about an empty room, but pleased he was. The light shining in through the windows made his hair shimmer like a gilded crown, and he smiled softly as he beheld the vacant space. 

He turned to face our hostess, his hands clasped before him.

“My good woman,” said he, “this will do most excellently. I am a student of natural philosophy, and I am in need of laboratory space to continue my work.”

This was not the first I had heard of his requiring a laboratory of his own in Ingolstadt. He had mentioned the matter to me the previous night, in the midst of laying out the course of his research for my consideration. At the moment I had paid it little attention, being more concerned with the plan of action he laid forth. 

I confess I little understood the methods he proposed to use, or the list of materials he described, nor did I comprehend in the slightest any of the theories he attempted to expound to me. But I knew well enough what drove him in his pursuit of knowledge, and for this reason I eagerly agreed to work alongside him. 

Naturally, it is Frankenstein himself who is best suited to shed light on the inner machinations of his mind. Yet having known him longer than any other now living, I think I may speak towards the factors that contributed towards his single-minded devotion to his studies in our time at the university.

Frankenstein's interests had always tended towards natural philosophy, even when we were children together. He had seen the suffering that disease and death visited on the human race, though our own little circle was at yet untouched by that grim phantom. And he had determined it unfair that so many should be tortured by the pain of disease or the loss of a loved one -- his mind made up, he set his sights on eliminating the twin specters, though, aiming high from the first, he determined first to banish death, and afterwards to attack disease, if it did not vanish along with death.  



End file.
